Nearly 75% of all U.S. restaurant traffic now happens off-premises — takeout, drive-thru, and delivery — according to the National Restaurant Association's 2025 research. Online and mobile ordering sit at the center of that shift, and how a restaurant fulfills those orders increasingly decides whether a location is profitable.
Below are 50+ verified statistics on restaurant online ordering and delivery for 2026, grouped by theme. Every figure links to a named, dated source — from the National Restaurant Association and SEC filings (DoorDash, Uber, Domino's, Chipotle) to Bloomberg Second Measure, Statista, NCR Voyix, Paytronix, HungerRush, and YouGov.
The three numbers worth memorizing
- ~75% of U.S. restaurant traffic is now off-premises (takeout, drive-thru, delivery). (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- 15–30% is what the major apps charge restaurants in delivery commission per order, before add-on fees. (DoorDash & Uber Eats official pricing, 2025–2026)
- 58% of customers prefer to order delivery through a restaurant's own app or website rather than a third party. (NCR Voyix, 2025)
Off-premises is the new default
- Nearly 75% of all restaurant traffic is off-premises — almost three of every four orders are takeout, drive-thru, or delivery. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- Takeout is the most common off-premises method, followed by drive-thru and then delivery. (National Restaurant Association, Off-Premises Restaurant Trends 2025)
- Off-premises is now a bigger share of sales for 58% of limited-service and 41% of full-service operators than it was in 2019. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- 51% of Gen Z and millennials call takeout or drive-thru "essential" to their lifestyle; 41% say the same about delivery. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- For scale: the U.S. restaurant industry is projected to reach $1.5 trillion in sales in 2025, across more than 1 million locations and 15.9 million workers. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
The online delivery market — and who controls it
- The U.S. restaurant-delivery segment is projected at roughly $39 billion in revenue in 2025. (Statista Market Insights, 2025)
- About 43% of U.S. consumers are projected to use restaurant delivery in 2025. (Statista Market Insights, 2025)
- DoorDash (with Caviar) captured 67% of U.S. meal-delivery sales; Uber Eats held 23%, with Grubhub and others splitting the rest. (Bloomberg Second Measure, March 2024)
The scale of the delivery giants (from their own filings)
- DoorDash's Marketplace Gross Order Value hit $80.2 billion in 2024, up 20% year over year. (DoorDash Form 10-K, FY2024)
- DoorDash processed 2.6 billion orders in 2024 — up from 2.16 billion in 2023. (DoorDash Form 10-K, FY2024)
- DoorDash served 42 million+ monthly active users in December 2024, up from 37 million a year earlier. (DoorDash Form 10-K, FY2024)
- DoorDash counted 22 million+ paid DashPass and Wolt+ members at the end of 2024. (DoorDash Form 10-K, FY2024)
- Uber's Delivery gross bookings reached $20.1 billion in Q4 2024 alone, up 18% year over year. (Uber Technologies Q4/FY2024 results, 2025)
What third-party delivery actually costs a restaurant
- DoorDash charges restaurants 15% (Basic), 25% (Plus), or 30% (Premier) commission on delivery — and 6% on pickup. (DoorDash Merchant Pricing, 2025)
- Uber Eats charges 20% (Lite), 25% (Plus), or 30% (Premium) on delivery; a 2026 increase — its first in about a decade — raised the entry tier from 15% to 20% and pickup from 6% to 7%. (Uber Eats via Restaurant Dive, 2026)
- New York City permanently caps third-party fees at 15% for delivery, plus 5% for other services and 3% for transactions. (New York City Council, 2021)
- Third-party services can absorb up to nearly one-third of the profit from a restaurant's digital-ordering channel. (Paytronix Online Ordering Report, 2025)
- The average consumer-paid third-party delivery fee fell about $1.10 year over year — DoorDash's dropped $1.82. (Intouch Insight Third-Party Delivery Report, 2025)
On a restaurant doing $1 million a year in marketplace delivery, a 15–30% commission is $150,000–$300,000 handed to a third party — before packaging, promotions, and refunds. That gap is why the direct-ordering data below has become a boardroom topic.
Consumers increasingly want to order direct
- 58% of customers prefer to use a restaurant's own app or website to order delivery — split evenly, 29% app and 29% website. (NCR Voyix Customer Experience Report, 2025)
- Top reasons diners order direct: convenience (65%), easier customization (50%), and earning loyalty points (36%). (NCR Voyix, 2025)
- 56% of consumers say they're likely to order directly from a restaurant rather than through a third party. (HungerRush consumer survey, 2024)
- 67% of consumers are at least sometimes deterred from third-party apps by the added delivery and service fees — 35% are "definitely" deterred. (HungerRush national survey, 2024)
- 38% of consumers say they're ordering delivery less than they used to because of inflation. (NCR Voyix, 2025)
Direct (first-party) ordering wins on the numbers
- Digital orders now make up roughly a third of all restaurant orders — about a 50% jump over pre-pandemic levels. (Paytronix Online Ordering Report, 2025)
- Diners tip more on direct orders: $4.44 on first-party versus $1.89 on third-party. (Paytronix, 2025)
- Direct customers come back sooner: 33 days between visits versus 43.1 days for third-party. (Paytronix, 2025)
- 41% of first-party orders come from loyalty members — versus just 3% of third-party orders. (Paytronix, 2025)
- First-party orders carry a higher average item price: $12.35 versus $10.65 on third-party. (Paytronix, 2025)
- Orders complete about 4x faster on native mobile apps than on the web. (Paytronix Online Ordering Report, 2025)
Mobile, technology, and who's ordering
- 57% of adults have recently used mobile ordering — including 74% of millennials and 65% of Gen Z adults. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- 75% of delivery customers say tech-enabled ordering and payment matter when choosing where to order. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- 49% of restaurant operators plan to invest in contactless or mobile ordering and payment in 2025. (National Restaurant Association, 2025)
- 17% of Americans have food delivered at least once a week — while 48% never do. (YouGov, 2026)
- Among urban adults under 45 earning $100k+, 68% order delivery at least weekly. (YouGov, 2026)
The proof from the chains: digital sales mix
- Domino's generated more than 85% of its U.S. retail sales through digital channels in 2024. (Domino's Pizza FY2024 results, 2025)
- Chipotle's digital sales were 35.1% of food-and-beverage revenue for full-year 2024 (34.4% in Q4). (Chipotle Q4/FY2024 results, 2025)
Methodology: Every statistic on this page was verified against the linked primary or reputable source and carries its publication year. Market-research outlook figures (e.g., Statista) are projections and labeled as such. Journalists and researchers are welcome to cite these numbers with attribution to KitchenRush and a link to this page, alongside the original primary source. Last updated July 3, 2026.
KitchenRush is the all-in-one operating system that helps independent restaurants run marketing, online ordering, reviews, and operations from one place — and keep more of every order by owning the direct channel. kitchenrush.app